2nd gen grille came in two pieces???

Hey TW,

I just Received my grille, all back... didn’t want to paint/plastic dip the Original chrome one, but know I’m thinking I should of!

So it came in two pieces and the front pice has several tabs.. (I broke two)
For the back pice to receive. I’ve tried top to bottom, left to right, right to left... but the tabs don’t stay in. I didn’t try bottom to top .... well because quite frankly I was to frustrated after the 7 plus attempts yes I tried each way twice and attempted top to bottom three times.....

So HELP!!!!

please someone tell me what I’m doing wrong? Or helpful tips you Learned after some good ole trial and error on your grille mod. Thanks in advance!!!

 

I’m hopefully going to be putting a different grill on mine soon.. do you have pics for the forum to check out?

 

Sure here is the “front” pice.. Excuse the bedding, lol the old lady won that war...

 

Here are the tabs...

 

I can't understand what you're trying to say, but I can tell you the '05-'11 grills are not made to come apart. The tabs are melted over.

 

interesting. I was planning on finding a 2nd gen grill to take the middle grill piece out and just put it in my grill.

Not possible?

 

Interesting, mine came in 2 pieces?

 

You could possibly grind away the melted tabs and then put the 2 pieces together with panel bond adhesive or epoxy.

 

Hmm so it’s gonna take some creativity. We’ll see how it goes. Might just leave the current grill if that’s the case.

 

yeah OP if this grill wasn’t meant to take apart like this.. then you have a broken grill. You’ll have to start bonding things to keep it together.

 

Yes I can attest to that. I took one apart & put it back together to color match my impulse red 2006. Toyota didn't sell one in that color. So cut tabs & used soldering gun to melt tabs back on.
I never saw one come in two pieces OP. Did you buy it from a dealer?

 

was it fairly easy, and did it look okay once you had it back in? Or could you tell it was done that way

 

No it looked factory. I took the surround to Toyota to color match the paint. It was all in the back of the grill and stayed together fine. No issue just took my time.

 

This is from when I explained it back in the day ...

 

OP I think you need to melt the tabs back together for the main grill and surround. Then clip the surround back in, if I’m reading this right

 

Weird, my second gen just came apart with some push tabs

 

I’m too tired for this. Lol

 

We've both got 2-1/2 gens. The 05-11 2nd gens have a different grill and surround.

 

No I got it from a parts dealer. But it came in two pieces.

 

Ahhh!! The world of after market parts, you get what you get.